The present invention relates in general to spray regulators or aerators for use in connection with faucets and the like, and in particular to a spray regulator of the type which includes flow dispersing means cooperating with a flow deflecting member, aerating means including an air suction member and a sieve-like spray regulator communicating with the flow outlet; the flow deflecting member has a bevelled flow deflecting surface defining a flow breaking edge and forming with the flow dispersing member an annular passage which is inclined to the direction of flow.
Spray adjusters of this kind are known from prior art and serve for mixing a jet of a liquid discharged from the faucet with gas, in most cases water with air, and simultaneously producing a uniformly distributed spray. The spray regulators of this kind are used most frequently in connection with water faucets for wash basins in kitchens. Prior-art spray regulators, however, possess considerable disadvantages. For example, conventional spray regulators include flow dispersing components which effectively disperse the water jet but, in doing so, generate considerable noise.
Also known are spray regulators which operate relatively noiselessly, since they consist usually of only a flow dispersing perforated plate. Additional flow deflecting devices such as buffer plates and the like flow deflecting elements for the dispersed partial streams are missing. The resulting advantages of silent operation and of simple construction, however, are counterbalanced by impaired dispersion of the flow jet. Attempts have been made to avoid the latter disadvantage by the provision of an increased number of jet regulating sieves. For example, known are flow adjusters whose flow dispersing member consists substantially of a single perforated plate but including frequently five or six flow regulating sieves. Such an increased number of sieves, however, becomes susceptible to calcification and brings about the danger that the flow regulating passages are quickly reduced, thus impairing the function of the device.
In spray adjusters designed with buffer plates for achieving an improved flow deflection, one encounters again the aforementioned relatively large generation of noise. Attempts have been made to provide flow deflecting plates which are inclined relative to the direction of flow, so as to reduce the noise. Nevertheless, in such prior-art solutions the deflected flow has been directed again against a buffer body which is located substantially perpendicular to the direction of deflected flow, and consequently the noise level remained comparatively high.